


let them talk 'cause we're dancing in this world alone

by amyscascadingtabs



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Dating, Developing Relationship, Dorks in Love, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, One Shot, Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 08:17:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17463890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amyscascadingtabs/pseuds/amyscascadingtabs
Summary: The door opens to the exact amount of eclectic chatter she associates with Shaw’s bar an early Monday afternoon, allowing her to breathe out for a moment’s peace, and then a shout from the familiar voice of Charles Boyle.“The lovebirds have arrived!”So clearly it is going to be weird.or, Jake and Amy go to Shaw's for the first time as a couple.





	let them talk 'cause we're dancing in this world alone

**Author's Note:**

> request from alys07: "I was wondering if you could write the first time the squad goes to Shaw’s after Amy and Jake start dating and they get teased a lot?"
> 
> whether this counts as teasing or not, I'm not sure, but it's something along those lines!
> 
> title from a world alone by lorde.

Despite the disheartening fact that their three original rules for not making things weird at work all fail, Amy doesn't consider their first four days of being both work partners and romantic partners to be a full-blown catastrophe in regards to professionalism. 

Truly, it's better than she expected. There’s the odd lingering glance or a few words at the end of a professional work mail, there's the way she finds the edges of her mouth twitch upwards and the way her cheeks heat when she looks up to see him there across from her, but there’s no more captains having heart attacks or security cameras recording them making out against shelves of evidence boxes. She has to count that as progress.

Outside of work, with no code of professionalism they have to adhere too, dating Jake Peralta may just be paradise. It's scary to admit how hard and fast she's falling for him - for how easy they work together, for the way he makes her laugh and for the way his arms and lips and body spell out  _ home, home, home _ \- but she is. Even in spite of her lingering fear this will all crash and burn, Amy loves dating Jake.

 

One thing she doesn't love quite as much? Charles Boyle’s love for her new relationship. She was prepared for the man being enthusiastic, seeing as he's been pushing for her and Jake to get together since their first handshake, but this enthusiasm is reaching new levels each day. If it's not claims of being able to sense their so-called post-sex-glow when they arrive to work in the morning or repeated offers to give them a list of his favorite date restaurants, it's constant knowing looks or less than subtle winks neither she nor Jake appreciates. 

All things considered, Charles’s passion is a small price to pay, but that doesn't stop it from annoying her. Thus, the one-on-one time they're currently having waiting for the coffee to finish brewing has her on edge the moment he joins her in the break room. 

“So”, he greets her, lingering on the  _ o _ longer than necessary, “How was your morning? Slept well?”

“Great, thanks.”

“So does that mean you two lovebirds stayed at your place tonight? I know from experience Jake's bed is not exactly most comfortable.”

“That's not actually of your business - you’ve slept in Jake's bed?” She raises an eyebrow at him.

“Uh-huh.” Charles nods. “Several times. Terribly unergonomic, though I understand you’d be willing to put up with it for - “

“Please don’t”, she mutters, knowing well what he's implying. Just because it's true doesn't mean she wants to discuss it with Charles right now. 

“Right, right.” The man lifts his cheek and purses his lips slightly, as if trying to put on a more serious expression, but she can see the glee shining through. The black liquid they're both waiting for drips at an excruciatingly slow pace into the pot, and she wills for it to speed up, free her from this awkward interaction. 

“I was just going to ask you”, Charles continues, “if you wanted to come with us to Shaw’s after work. A classic detective’s hang-out. Everyone as usual.”

“Yeah, of course.” The coffee is done, and she gestures for him to pour himself a cup before she does. “You don't have to ask.”

“Jake's going to be there.”

“I figured.”

“You guys are going to have your first Shaw’s hangout as a couple!” All traces of the detective’s earlier composed expression seem to have disappeared with this realization, because he’s practically beaming as he pours milk and a cube of white sugar into his cup. “It’s going to be so cute!”

“Don’t make it weird”, she mutters.

“It's not weird! It's beautiful!” He gives her no time to answer before he's practically bouncing away to his desk, wide smile still on his lips. 

“See -” Amy shakes her head despite talking to thin air. “- that definitely just made it weird.”

 

“It's not weird, right? We’ve been to Shaw’s together like, hundreds of times.” Jake waits for her while she finishes up work, never allowing for herself to leave the precinct if she’s not found the perfect stopping point. Her staying later to do so isn’t out of the ordinary - him sitting on the corner of her desk while she does, tapping his foot and playing with a rubik’s cube in a distracted sort of patience, is. 

“Totally”, he agrees. “It’s not weird at all. Not to rush you, but are you done soon?”

“Now.” She adds the last point on her to-do post-it note for tomorrow and sticks it to the computer screen. “Are we taking the car or can you live with walking a few hundred meters?”

“We can walk if you want to walk.” He hands her her coat and she gratefully accepts it. It’s only been four days, but outside of the physical, these small gestures are the main difference Amy is noting in her life dating Jake Peralta. These tiny but meaningful acts he does to show his affection just gets her, has her heartbeat speeding and her thoughts realizing she’s falling for him all too fast already. 

 

He takes her hand when they step outside the precinct. She blushes, and he's quick to ask if she doesn't want him to, but she simply squeezes it tighter to assure him she does. Holding hands is yet another thing new to her, not something she’s made a habit of in any previous relationships, another detail she's getting used to.

Their hands fit well together. It feels like a good sign.

“You can't kiss me while I'm there”, she warns him when they're nearing the bar. “Charles would spontaneously combust.”

“Right, right.” He runs his fingers through his hair, shrugging before a familiar grin reappears on his lips. “I can kiss you after, though. Or more.”

“Really, huh?” She rolls her eyes at the slight arrogance, ignoring the high probability of what he’s implying. “We’re doing my place tonight, by the way.”

“My place is closer to the precinct, though.”

“Clean out the mold I found in your shower yesterday and I’ll stay over more.”

“So many demands”, he whines, but she can tell he’s partly faking. “I’ll have to hire a cleaning service.”

“You can afford that?” 

“I’d do it for you.” It's part joking, she knows, the romantic tone in his voice too exaggerated to be serious, yet the way he looks down and avoids eye-contact as he says it makes her suspect there's a hint of truth to it.

She can't reflect further on it, though, because they've arrived outside Shaw's, bracing themselves for their entrance.

“It's going to be fine”, he promises when she lets go of his hand. “They're our friends. It's not weird.”

“Totally not.”

“They probably won't even care that we’re there together.”

“Right.” She nods twice, mentally preparing herself for the challenge by looking from his relaxed expression to the door which feels like it's taunting her. “Let's do this.”

 

The door opens to the exact amount of eclectic chatter she associates with Shaw’s bar an early Monday afternoon, allowing her to breathe out for a moment’s peace, and then a shout from the familiar voice of Charles Boyle.

“The lovebirds have arrived!”

So clearly it  _ is _ going to be weird.

 

After Amy has finished feeling like she's going to sink through the floor and has been talked out of giving Charles a serious yelling-at in front of the entire bar, they get drinks. With their own money, as yet another safety measure in order to make Charles calm down. The bar is uncommonly lively - a friend group in a corner singing Happy Birthday in a varied range of false tones, a sea of backs of shirts of people she vaguely recognizes and people she’s never seen - and in a matter of seconds after they've grabbed their beers and he's squeezed her hand while saying something she can't quite make out, she's managed to lose track of Jake. She spins around, spies one way and then the other, realizing she must look like a toddler separated from her parents at Disney World.

“Amy!” Rosa’s voice is the first one she recognizes, guiding her to one of few free barstools. She hurries there, gratefully thanking her friend for finding a spot.

“I swear I don't understand why so many people insist on going here”, she tries for a conversation-starter. “It's not  _ that  _ great.”

“Dude,  _ we _ go here all the time.”

“Fair, but it's close and we’re too lazy to find another place.” Rosa gives her a meaning look, and she budges. “Fine, I see your point. How was your day? I’ve barely seen you.”

“I was out on a case the entire day. Interviewed witnesses for a suspected murder.”

“Oohh, that sounds exciting! I just had a questioning and then a bunch of paperwork.”

“You love paperwork.”

“Well, yeah, but Jake was out on a case most of the day - “

“A- _ ha _ !” Rosa’s face lights up, a grin wider than the last time Amy brought up Charles’ Mr. Grape-outfit on her lips. “First two minutes! I just won twenty dollars from Gina.”

“What is happening?”

“Gina and I bet on how long I could hold a casual conversation with you before you mentioned Jake.” Rosa shrugs. “She said three minutes. I said less. Now she owes me twenty dollars.”

“Not cool.”

“Hey, Santiago, it’s  _ sweet _ . You don’t have to worry”, her friend assures her, giving her a light, half-ironic pat on the shoulder. “I won't tease you too bad for dating the one person you promised a gazillion times during your first year here you’d never date.”

“Great”, she grumbles, unconvinced by Rosa’s words.

“I do have to say though - those security footage tapes!” The dark-haired woman laughs, tapping her glass of whisky against Amy’s beer bottle. “I thought I was going to have to do CPR on Charles. He was about to collapse of excitement.”

“Charles is Charles.”

“Can’t blame him, though. You went there! Gotta say, I’m impressed. Never took you for one to press someone up against a wall at work.”

“I’m not.” She massages her temples while tipsy Rosa speaks, thus far unaffected by Amy’s discomfort. “Nevermind - I don’t want to talk about it right now.”

“I’m impressed, is all. A little bit longer and you two would have been in the midst of creating a full on at-work sextape.”

“Yeah, I’m leaving.” She slides down from the barstool with those words, grabbing her drink and searching for someone else, someone not in the mood for teasing her about her new relationship and temporary irrational decision-making. She loves Rosa, loves having fun with the tipsier and more talkative version of her, but she needs out of invasive conversations she’s not ready for. 

 

After what feels like eternity, but is probably closer to a minute or two, she finds Terry. He's leaning against the wall, smile directed at his phone, and feels like a safe enough card for conversations not about her dating life. She'll just ask about his daughters and she'll be fine.

“Amy! Just the person I wanted to see!” He lights up when he sees her, pocketing his phone and nearly missing. He must have had a few sips of alcohol, she deduces. 

“Huh?”

“I’ve been meaning to apologize to you! For the other day, my reaction when I found out about you and Jake - “

“Oh. Oh, no.”  _ Not another one _ .

Terry doesn’t notice Amy’s uncomfortable grimace. “That thing about professional work environment, I just said that because I had to”, he explains, lip trembling as if he’s about to start crying. “On a personal level, I am  _ so  _ supportive! Terry loves love!”

“It’s okay, Terry, you don’t have to - “ She tries to reach to pat his shoulder in a friendly manner, but is pulled into a massive hug instead, the sergeant’s arms too strong for her to slip out of it and breathe comfortably again.

“Hey, there’s Jake!  _ Jake! _ ” Another person is pulled into the hug, being squeezed too tight by Terry for Amy to identify if it’s actually her boyfriend before she recognizes his muffled voice.

“Terry, you need to let us go so we can breathe.”

“I’m just so happy you two found each other”, he sniffles, wiping away a single tear. “Love is beautiful!”

“Yeah, okay, we hear you.” Jake brushes at his green plaid, adjusting a wrong button. “Are you drunk by any chance?”

“I had half a beer”, he hiccups. “My alcohol tolerance…”

“Has really changed since you had kids”, Jake and Amy repeat in tandem, having heard the reasoning at every other Shaw’s visit Terry’s come to since the birth of his daughters. Their eyes meet, noticing the returned presence of each other, and the ubiquitous moment of eye contact is enough for the corners of her mouth to shape to a timid smile by instinct.

She’s too far gone - they’ve been apart for some ten minutes and seeing him again still plants a colony of cliché butterflies in her stomach.

“You guys are so  _ cute _ ”, interrupts the sergeant again. “You know what, you guys go sit down and I’ll get you two drinks.” He disappears toward the bar disk, leaving them alone together.

 

“This has been a weird night”, Amy mumbles before awkward silence has a shot to take over, noticing a free table nearby and grabbing his hand to guide him there. “Rosa’s already bullied me about our accidental makeout tape.”

“Yes, well, Charles  _ wept _ .” Jake fakes a shudder. “Then he talked about his ideas for our, quote unquote, ultra-romantic and idyllic farm wedding which will go down in history as the greatest wedding of all time, for ten minutes.”

“Wow.”

“He also gave me a list of baby names, which I threw away.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” He grins, the same dopey grin that could annoy the living shit out of Amy when they first started working together. It still does, to some extent, but for widely different reasons - now she’s annoyed by how desperately it makes her want to feel those grinning lips underneath her own, against her neck, shoulders -

It’s distracting, frankly. 

“Charles is intense”, she says instead. 

“Mm-hmm.” His hand brushes against hers, almost intertwining their fingers, and then he freezes. “He’s also right here.”

“Mind if we sit?” Charles asks and Rosa doesn’t, but neither of them waits for a reply before sitting down across from Jake and Amy.

_ If you don’t ask us invasive questions or make fun of us _ , Amy wants to wheeze, but these are her friends and she  _ does  _ want to hang out with them, so she just nods, hoping their exacerbated enthusiasm will have calmed down by now.

 

To a beginning, it almost seems like they have. She steers the conversation toward a recent case of hers and the others chip in, talking about ones of their own or adding thoughts about hers. Terry brings the drinks he promised to get them before excusing himself by saying he wants to go home to Sharon and the kids. Outside of the inevitable fact that Charles is making heart eyes at Jake whenever he agrees with or adds onto something Amy says, it almost seems like a normal night at Shaw's. It’s effortless and homely. An air of tipsiness settles in, making the consequences of her actions seem a little less dire, her words a little less forced. Jake retells a humorous incident about Scully, the bumper pool table and a cup of coffee from this morning and she’s laughing a little louder, not because the story is unusual but because of the way he tells it; like it’s designed to make her laugh.

“That’s really funny”, she manages when she comes down from the fit of laughter. He lights up, does the familiar nod she knows to mean he’s pleased, and she wishes again they were alone so she could do more than return the smile. Just a little while longer. 

“Thanks, Ames - by the way, I think you have a bit of lipstick…” He dips the tip of his finger in the glass of water she’s got herself in an attempt to prevent Four-Drink Amy from disrupting her appropriateness, stroking carefully at a spot on her cheek and wiping the color away with a napkin. “There.”

“Thanks”, she whispers. The alcohol is slowing her reflexes, and it takes a while for her to realize how close together their faces are. She backs away despite her desire to do the opposite.

“Wow”, Rosa snorts. “You guys really  _ are _ dating. That’s so weird.”

“It’s not weird, Ro-Ro”, comes Charles’ dreamy voice from where he’s gazing at them with the expression of a proud parent. “It’s  _ beautiful _ .”

“Ugh.” Rosa grimaces. “Nah. I’m totally supportive of you guys and your happiness or whatever, but I draw the line at calling you beautiful.”

“Well, thank you for supporting our happiness or whatever.” Jake grins. “Wanna leave, Ames?”

Charles look follows them with interest as they grab their coats and head out after saying a hasty goodbye, but Jake’s holding her hand again, so Amy’s noticing little else about the world. 

 

“Okay”, he says when they’re outside. “That wasn’t  _ too  _ terrible, right?”

She scrapes the toe of her shoe against the pavement, looking down and then up at him before answering. “It was… something for sure.”

“Yeah.” He shrugs, puts one of his sneakers next to her shoe so they’re bumping into each other. “They just have to get used to it, though. It’ll be back to normal soon enough.”

“If it’s any consolation”, she says, finally daring to make eye contact with him now and finding she’s missed those gleaming brown eyes, the ones appearing darker in the evening light.  “I thought it was worth it.”

His cheeks color, and from the way he picks at a jacket tag near his neck she can tell he's nervous. 

She kisses him first.

It's not the first time or second, but it's one of the early ones, one she’d in any other relationship count toward the learning curve of knowing how to kiss this one person, except she can't imagine this being anything but at the top of the curve already. It's like he knows how to kiss her, knows the pressure and body contact she loves, knows to rest his hands on her shoulders while she cups his face with her hands. 

It’s like he’s always known. 

It’s not logical, per se, but logic has never been a defining factor in her relationship with Jake Peralta and it is even less so now, wiped out from the horizon when she kisses him back, fighting to prove to him that she knows, too.

 

It’s new and it's weird and uncustomary and it's a mental list full of changes and adjustments down the line if they make it, because the  _ if _ is lingering there still, making her wonder what they’ll be able to handle and what they won't.

In comparison the way his hands rest on her thigh in the cab to her place, from the way she thoroughly enjoys her chance to press him up against her door once they're inside and the way she enjoys even more the noises he makes when her mouth meets that spot near his collarbone, she's thinking some teasing or overager colleagues will be an easy match.

 

Charles can write his wedding speech. Rosa can make fun of them. Heck, Gina can bully them when they meet again for all Amy cares.

She is dating Jake Peralta, and it's scary and wonderful and unlike anything she’d imagined it to be, and in this moment she wouldn't change it for anything in the world. 

**Author's Note:**

> so I know this is during the time where the vulture is their captain but I did not find it in me to write about the vulture in this piece so please ignore that little fact.
> 
> anyways, homegirl's falling hard and writing these two as early relationship when you're used to season six married beauty was slightly weird but here's my best effort. hope you enjoyed! comments and kudos very appreciated in this business, or come talk to me @ amyscascadingtabs on tumblr


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